Abstinence Education
by Madame Manga
Summary: Rin was sure Manji was listening to the soft splashing noises as she dipped her hands and sluiced the dust and sweat from her arms and breasts. Perhaps he imagined the shapes the water took, flowing over her body and filming her skin.
1. Chapter 1

**Note for this site:** This is only a teaser! I will not be archiving the entire story here because of its content. Please check my Livejournal for the complete version. Click on my name at the top of the page to see my profile and find a link to get there.

The characters and universe of Blade of the Immortal/_Mugen no Junin_ are copyrighted by Hiroaki Samura and do not belong to me. Not one _sen_ will come into my hands in consequence of this story. No, I don't wish I _owned_ Manji in the usual ficcer's fashion. But I like the rough-edged S.O.B. anyway just for knowing where his priorities ought to lie.

This is set during the month or more between the return from Kaga and Giichi's visit. SPOILERS through English issue #98 and collection #14, "Last Blood". Rin and Manji are living in his hut on the outskirts of Edo; Rin has been training during this quiet spell in their existence. Manji doesn't have enough to do, so he's getting restless. After realizing she has surpassed her previous mediocre standard of swordwork, Rin kisses Manji on the mouth while he is sleeping. But at the same time, she tells herself that she "can't go back there", because "someday I'll have to leave this man behind."

So what was that all about? Here's a speculation.

Author's note: If you are not a regular reader of Blade of the Immortal/_Mugen no Junin_, the manga's unusual contrast of period setting and semi-modern sensibilities may strike you as strange. Much of the manga's dialog is written in 21st-century street-smart Tokyo dialect, and the English-translated version released by Dark Horse renders that in American slang to keep a similar flavor. So the numerous anachronistic expressions in this story should be taken as intended in the spirit of the original. The culture of feudal-era Japan is a particular interest of mine, and I've tried to give a sense of the historical setting. But I hope I know better as a fan fiction writer than to pedantically "correct" anything that Samura-_sensei_ has introduced in a world of his own creation.

I adore feedback. All kinds! Please consider posting a review, or email me at the address in my profile. I pay close and grateful attention to comments and crit; IMO, that's the only way to improve as a writer. I'll include a few notes on historical trivia as needed, but this ain't exactly a research paper! ;-) Have fun…

Squick warnings: Sex in various forms, including quasi-incestuous themes and a 16-year-old female paired with an adult male. Violence will eventually rear its head as well; hey, you have to separate at least one body part from its owner in any BotI story.

**Abstinence Education**

**by Madame Manga**

**Part One**

Manji was asleep now and snoring in long penetrating rattles, the way he always did when he'd drunk a reasonable amount of _saké_. Rin sighed and turned over with a rustle of the straw pile that served her for a mattress. The close air in the hut felt sultry, even sticky. Although they were sword-training so hard during this quiet spell of their existence that she ached with tiredness every night, the combination of Manji's snoring and the too-warm temperature made sleep elusive.

After kicking off the quilt, she folded back the collar of her light cotton _yūkata_ and stroked the sweaty skin between her breasts. She wished she could pull back the blanket that covered the door to catch any breeze there might be, but the mosquitoes would eat her alive, so she didn't stir. Manji grumbled and snorted in his sleep.

Rin slowly shifted and rotated until she could look at him. A glow of moonlight seeped through the paper-screened window, bright enough to make out objects across the single room and pick out the expression on a face. Manji lay on his left side with his arm flung out and his mouth wide open, looking abandoned though not quite vulnerable. The shoulders of his _yūkata_ were pulled down to the waist, exposing his scarred arms and chest, and his quilt covered him only to the thighs; probably he was feeling too hot as well. But he was definitely asleep. Sometimes she envied him his ability to nap anywhere at any time of day and ignore all distractions and discomforts. His face twitched and worked; what was he dreaming about?

A brief frown creased his brows and then his expression smoothed. Was he fighting someone in the dream? He didn't look confident of victory, but he was resigned to his fate. An almost-familiar look: once he had lain on his side in a pool of his own blood and gazed up at a woman that way. At Otonotachibana Makie.

In some ways Makie-_san_ was everything Rin wanted to be. All grown up, a beautiful woman any man would admire. And a fighter like no one she had ever imagined: even Anotsu Kagehisa bowed down before her ability. By the shore of a mountain lake she had watched Anotsu watch Makie destroy eight men in his defense, and ever since then she had wanted to put that same look on his face some day. Just before she struck off his head…

Manji was still dreaming, and the subject of the dream was a little clearer; he raised his brows, smiled lasciviously and rolled over on his back. Under the thin concealment of the _yūkata_ Rin detected an increasing outcropping of his groin.

She stared at it for a few moments and then turned away with her face burning. She had noticed something stirring there on a few occasions and she knew a little about what it signified, though she had never seen Manji entirely naked, nor indeed any man. Usually he took some pains to avoid offending her modesty, though it wasn't easy in this small hut. She had twice caught him in nothing but a _fundoshi_ loincloth, and both times he had instantly put something over it and yelled at her for creeping around as quietly as a mouse.

She wondered not for the first time how Manji was able to live with her, sleep in the same room, wash from the same basin, and still treat her almost as chastely as if she really had been his little sister. Almost…

One day after a stiff fencing practice she had washed in the shelter of the porch, Manji sitting well around the corner of the hut to give her privacy. The lapses in their conversation grew so long that the silence spoke more and more loudly. Rin was sure Manji was listening to the soft splashing noises as she dipped her hands and sluiced the dust and sweat from her arms and breasts. Perhaps he imagined the shapes the water took, flowing over her body and filming her skin. Like the path his hands would take if they traced the same curves...

A chill doused her that had nothing to do with the unheated water. Her own fantasy? Or an answered echo from his mind, picked from the unseen yet articulate air between them. Who could say where such thoughts came from? A drop fell from one crinkled nipple and plinked in the basin; she heard Manji's back shift against the wall of the hut: and a small, tight, liquid sound as if he had swallowed hard against an obstruction.

Almost immediately after that he had gotten up with a muttered oath and left to buy something for their evening meal, and he had stayed away for a long while.

It wasn't easy for a man to set these things entirely aside in relation to a woman. He'd made jokes about sex at first, probably meaning to mock it in the open rather than leave it to grow under cover; she hadn't realized the wisdom of that course until recently. He knew his own weaknesses, like any good swordsman.

Now he never mentioned that particular failing.

During Rin's solo expedition to Kaga they had been parted for weeks, their first separation since they had met. Manji hadn't said much about his quest to follow and find her, but Rin realized he must have put forth tremendous efforts to overcome the obstacles in his way. Maybe his manner towards her had acquired this little edge of tension since their reunion, his single eye resting on her sometimes with a wary light in it. Then again, her long absence from his side might only have pulled into clearer relief an element that had always been present.

Rin thought she could remember every occasion on which Manji had let the façade slip a little; he would call her his woman or make a remark along similar lines: no one was allowed to harm her on pain of death. Of course he was her _yōjimbō_—guarding her was his calling. At their first meeting he had said Rin resembled his lost little sister, and he now stood virtually in the place of an elder brother or even of her murdered father. But even in that first hour of their acquaintance Rin had assumed or perhaps divined another undercurrent in Manji's behavior towards her.

Not a tendency that he would ever admit, she knew. He sneered at his own sentiments when he gave any evidence that he had them. Suffering the agony of severed limbs seemed no great effort in comparison to saying anything about the depth or the nature of their unusual attachment. Perhaps he had taken it as an insult when she first tried to offer her body as collateral for his sword arm, but the explosiveness of his refusal might almost have confirmed a fact. That darker element she sensed had nothing to do with the disinterested duties of a guardian, and he probably knew that all too well.

Rin wondered how she felt about the possibility, and what, if anything, she should do. Manji was ten years her senior, hardened and experienced, and she had a dim idea of the mismatch between a man's forceful urges and a girl's tender longings. This wasn't a temporary awkwardness that would pass away, because Manji's body and his desires would never weaken with age. Constantly restored and healed by the strange _kessen_-_chu_ that circulated in his blood, he would remain youthful and virile forever while Rin left skinny sixteen behind her. One day, perhaps soon, she would be a woman fully arrived at adulthood. The situation could only multiply…

Suddenly Manji stirred and sat up in bed. He yawned, scratched the back of his head and rose, leaving the hut without a glance at her. Obviously he was visiting the latrine. Of course an imperative sensation arose as soon as that occurred to her, and so Rin got up herself, slipped her feet into her wooden _geta_ and waited beside the hut until he came back.

"Huh?" He peered at her when she emerged from the shadows into the moonlight and pulled his _yūkata_ up over his shoulders to cover his chest. "What are you doing out of bed?"

"Same as you…" She brushed past him and went to the little lean-to that Manji had built over the pit toilet. The flies were getting numerous, but at least they weren't as active at night. Rin washed her hands in the pond and returned to the hut.

A smell of tobacco greeted her. Manji sat next to his bed, lighting his pipe with a coal from the remains of their cooking fire. She saw the little glow in the dark, a small ember brightening and waning under the influence of his breathing. Rin settled on her bed again; now feeling chilled from the trip outside and the cold water of the pond, she snuggled the quilt all the way over her body. Manji finished his pipeful, smoked another and tapped out the pellet of ash, but he didn't lie down. She felt his gaze on her, and when he let out a quiet grunt that suggested discontent she rolled over and pushed up on one elbow.

"Manji? Anything wrong?"

"Just thinking." He scowled at her and flung himself on his own pile of straw.

"Thinking about what?"

"Go to sleep."

"But now I'm all curious."

"Don't be."

"Manji…"

"What?" Now he sounded thoroughly irritated, but she knew that was usually a pose, at least in relation to her.

"How long has it been…since you pillowed with a woman?" She swallowed. "Was it…Makie?"

He didn't answer for a few moments. "No."

"You mean you and she didn't…"

"She wanted to fight, remember? She almost killed me."

"But she was pretending to be a streetwalkerto get you alone. Didn't you even…touch her?"

Manji let out a disgusted snort. "Yeah, I came at her with my long hard weapon. And then she split me in half with hers. Why in hell are you bringing this up?"

"I…don't know. Manji, do you ever think about…"

"Oh, shit." He flung an arm over his head in a self-defensive gesture.

"About touching, um, a woman?" She twisted a handful of her quilt border and watched the folds tighten and relax.

"No." He said it with emphasis.

"Really? But I thought…"

"Hey, you don't like me buying whores, so what's the point of thinking about it?"

"But don't you need to? I mean, doesn't a man get unhealthy if he never…"

"I ain't dead yet." He turned his back on her and grunted in a way that meant the conversation was over.

"I said it was OK if you did. I just didn't want to know about it."

"Then I won't tell you." He responded to no more questions and was soon snoring again.

By the time Rin fell asleep, she had come to a decision. It would have to pass the test of morning light, but she felt sure it was the only alternative that could preserve some peace of mind on both their parts. And so she wept quietly with her head under the quilt, not wanting to betray herself to Manji. On the last night that they would share this little room.

Continued…

**Note on Japanese culture and nudity:** In pre-Westernized times, Japan had a blasé attitude to nudity. People often did their daily work in nothing but brief loincloths and walked home from the community bathhouse with their clothes tied in a bundle. Simple nudity had no particular sexual significance. Erotic pictures (_shunga_) usually show the participants in disarrayed clothing rather than nude.

After Japan was opened to the West in the 1850s and especially during the American occupation after WWII, Western sexual mores had a strongly puritanizing influence on Japanese laws and customs. _Mugen nō Jyuunin_ (Blade of the Immortal) has an air of modern Japanese culture in many respects, and almost never depicts the casual nudity typical of its nominal historical period, the 1780s. Therefore, more in keeping with the manga and the characters than with historical fact, I have surmised that Rin would be rather innocent about the human body.


	2. Chapter 2

**Note for this site:** This is only a teaser! I will not be archiving the entire story here because of its content. Please check my Livejournal for the complete version. Click on my name at the top of the page to see my profile and find a link to get there.

The characters and universe of Blade of the Immortal/_Mugen no Junin_ are copyrighted by Hiroaki Samura and do not belong to me. Not one _sen_ will come into my hands in consequence of this story.

Squick warnings: Sex in various forms, including quasi-incestuous themes and a 16-year-old female paired with an adult male. Violence will eventually rear its head as well; hey, you have to separate at least one body part from its owner in any BotI story.

**Note:** Rin's father's name is given early on in the translated manga as "Kurose" and later as "Takayoshi".

**Abstinence Education**

**by Madame Manga**

**Part Two**

"What the hell were you doing in town without me?" Manji got up from the porch as Rin approached and thrust both his swords through his _obi_. She had risen before dawn and left without awakening him. "I thought I told you not to go into the marketplace by yourself in case you ran into any Ittō_-ryū _guys." He pointed straight at her nose when she stopped in front of him. "Not to mention those scumbags who lurk in the bushes along the road just waiting to grab girls to sell! Do you even hear what I'm saying, or am I just breaking wind?"

"I brought my sword along." She glanced down at the long Chinese blade she carried slung through the straps of her shoulder bag. "I could have used it."

He lowered his finger and gave an exasperated sigh. "If there was only one of 'em coming at you, maybe you could scare him off if you bawled loud enough. But they work in pairs, see? Not a chance."

"I've been training a whole lot!" Rin frowned and brushed past Manji to find the remains of breakfast. He had left her two ears of corn laid out on the green husks. "You taught me how to handle two attacks at once, anyway. Don't you think I've learned anything yet?"

"After practicing blocks for a whole week? Gimme a break. You ain't half ready to take on a real bandit." Manji followed her back to the porch, leaned against a post with arms folded and watched her eat.

Rin took several mouthfuls and licked her fingers before replying. "Anyway, I didn't go to the marketplace, I went to a kimono merchant's. I had to sell something."

Manji raised a brow. "Didn't know you had any spare duds to get rid of."

"Um…a couple of my mother's fancy _uchikake _robes. I went to the house to look through the things I have stored there." She kept her eyes on the corncob in her hands.

"What?" His forehead creased; he straightened and looked a little alarmed. "You shouldn't have gone in there alone. That's where your parents…"

"I know. I made some offerings to their ghosts at a shrine, but there was plenty of money left over. Here." She reached into her shoulder bag and gave him ten gold _kōban_: a heavy little package done up in paper with the value written on the outside. "This is for you."

"Huh?" Manji weighed the package in his hand. "What for?"

"Your salary."

"My salary? You don't owe me this much." He fingered the strokes of the writing with an air of confused annoyance. "Anyhow, we never arranged it like this. You just paid for the inns and gave me some drinking money. What's with the big payoff?"

"Well…that's more or less what it is. Your payoff."

He shot a look at her, his brows going down.

"I'm giving you severance pay. I'm not employing you as my _yōjimbō_ any more."

The package dropped and broke open, spilling the big oval coins in the dirt. "What?" He seemed nearly panicked; his face changed color and his eye glared wide.

"You need to live your own life. You're a man…with a man's needs. I know you've been pretty, um, bored lately just training me. You don't want to have to babysit any longer. We can go our separate ways, and you can do whatever you want." Rin smiled, her heart pounding, and looked at the line of forest beyond the rice paddies to avoid seeing Manji's expression.

"You can't fire me!"

"Why not? If I could hire you, then I can—"

"Because…because that ain't how it goes, that's why! I'm not leavin' you on yer own, kid—you'd be dead in a week."

"I can take care of myself—"

"The hell you can!" Manji seized her by the shoulders and shook her hard; the half-eaten corn flew out of her hand. "You little idiot! If the Ittō_-ryū _hears you don't have a bodyguard, they'll deliver your head to Anotsu in a market bag!"

"The Ittō_-ryū's _concerned with just surviving! I don't believe Anotsu or his men are going to do anything about me soon, not with the _bakūfū_ after them."

"Oh, you're so sure about that?"

"Actually, I am. Remember, I was with him for days. I saw how he thinks—Manji, it's strange to say it, I know, but he's got a sense of honor. Maybe…too much of one. Plotting to kill someone like me just isn't the way he operates."

"Maybe so." Manji's chest gave a heave and he released her. "I guess that makes some kind of sense."

"Thank you. You know, I have to start building my life too, not just go after revenge."

"Build your life? Like how?"

Rin straightened her collar, took a deep breath and fingered one hair ring. "I'll go live at my family's _dōjō_ again. I have some acquaintances in the neighborhood…I need to visit them and re-introduce myself. I haven't been a part of the local society in years, but I am Asano Takayoshi's daughter." She raised her chin and looked Manji straight in the face. "I can make a place for myself with some effort. And that's what I'm going to do."

Manji's expression struck her oddly; he let out a short hard breath and went a little pale. "OK, I got you." His teeth gritted. "You don't want _me_ getting in your way."

"Manji?"

"I'm an outlaw." He pointed to his chest. "You'd scandalize your nice neighbors if you brought along a low-life like me on visiting rounds. Ol' Manji would just be a turd in yer rice bowl!"

Her mouth dropped open. "No…that's not what I…"

"But that's what it adds up to, don't it?" He turned his back and stalked a few paces away. "Fine, the hell with it. I ain't too hot with proper social etiquette anyhow."

"You forgot your money!"

"Can't go forgetting about money, can I?" Manji stooped and picked up the scattered coins. "Guess I can buy all the whores I want now, huh?"

"If you like. It's your business."

Still squatting on his haunches, he glared up at her. "What if buying whores and getting drunk wasn't what I had in mind for spending the rest of _my_ life, which if you recall is likely to be a damn long one?"

"You'd rather be fighting, I guess."

"Sure I would. In the right cause."

"You can find one. My vendetta isn't the only way to kill evil men."

"You think that's why I've been doing this?" He straightened and thrust the coins into the breast of his black and white _kōsōde_. "Month after month, and it's only about killing evil men on behalf of little Rin's vendetta?"

"Isn't that why you agreed to do it in the first place?"

"In the first place, yeah." Manji looked at her, his brows creasing. "Gotta admit I made a good dent in my thousand."

"Well, it could be a long time before I have to go look up Anotsu again. I can live quietly and train, and keep an eye on things. There wouldn't be anything for you to do anyway." She spread her hands and tried to look confidently mature, though she had to suppress her trembles. Manji's reaction had been the only thing she truly feared, far more than the Ittō_-ryū_; perhaps he would accept this if her determination didn't falter. "You'd still be bored hanging around. Probably it will be years before I know for sure what I need to do. By then I hope I'll be able to face him by myself."

"Not without me you won't."

"Manji, it's not your business any more. I just…laid you off, remember?"

His face twitched, the white scars standing out against his flushed skin. "No freakin' way."

"I'm leaving now." She shouldered her bag and straightened the sword. "Please don't follow me."

"Yeah, that would look kinda pathetic, wouldn't it? Big bad _samurai_ trailing after a little girl, begging to get cut up on her behalf. Shit!" He spat on the ground.

Rin flinched at the gesture and at the sheer anger in his voice. "Manji, please don't be mad…"

"Why the hell wouldn't I be mad? I just got told to take a hike!"

"I'm only trying to do what's best for both of us. I…I thought you'd be relieved."

"Huh? Relieved to get shot of you? You ain't making sense, kid."

"Well…uh, I've been noticing…" She hid her face in her hands for a moment, quivering with embarrassment. "You…maybe it's just my imagination, but I thought you might be getting, um, kind of uneasy around me…"

"Uneasy?" He put his fists on his hips and squinted his one eye at her. "Like…nervous? Why the hell would _you_ make me nervous?"

At that moment she had no idea why. Apparently she had miscalculated that factor, but there were other considerations as well. Weren't there? On the way into town she had worked out everything in detail and decided exactly what to say and what subjects to skirt around, but all logic and calm threatened to desert her now. Speaking these things to his face was vastly dissimilar from having an ideal conversation with the air…

"What's with you? Uneasy? Relieved? You're talking like I was—" He stopped short. Rin looked up, still quivering, and saw the realization flash across his face. "Oh, crap."

"I'm sorry, Manji! I wasn't sure—it was just—I'm sorry!"

"You think I want to get you in my bed? Is that it?" His upper lip contracted to show his teeth, but he seemed less angry than stunned, or even hurt. "You think I'm going to do something to you?"

"N-no! No, that's not what I meant!" She clamped a hand to her mouth and tried to hold back tears. This was going all wrong—this was ten times worse than she'd imagined.

"Shit! First she tells me to blow off because I'm such a disreputable character, then she calls me a pervert!" He seized the hilt of his _katana_ and shook it. "I dedicate my sword to her, kill dozens of guys to keep her safe, and this is the goddamn thanks I get. What's the freakin' use?"

Rin burst out crying and threw her arms around him. "M-Manji…no…oh, God…"

He drew a deep exasperated breath, but said nothing and didn't move away from her embrace.

Rin clutched him and buried her head against his chest, her sobs gradually subsiding. How odd—that she should first have insulted him and then begged him for his comfort. But of course since her parents' deaths he was the only person she had to hold any more. What was she doing by trying to push him away, as if a little sister could fire her big brother? She squeezed her streaming eyes shut and listened to Manji's heartbeat until his hand descended on her head and he patted her hair.

"There, there, kid…it's OK. I guess you didn't mean it like that after all." He stepped back half a pace. "You're getting me all wet, you know."

"S-sorry…" She dried her face on her sleeve and sniffled herself into a slightly calmer state. Manji waited with arms folded and an expression of barely restrained impatience.

"I'm sorry," she said again. "I didn't mean to hurt your feelings."

"My _feelings_?" He narrowed his eye. "What the hell does that have to do with the price of rice in China?"

"I only wanted to make you feel better. Let you be with…other people."

"You honestly think you're doing this for me? Like I can't stand giving up a few opportunities to get laid? Look, kid—ask before you start making big assumptions like that."

"I…I thought I had."

"You did? Like when?"

"Well, last night." She flushed and hung her head. "I asked you if you needed a woman."

"And I said it was no big deal, didn't I? What's the matter, you don't believe me?"

"Err…"

"Did I do something to make you think I'm lying? Don't think so." He took her chin and raised her face, examining her with a probing air. "Rin…spit it out. What's eating you?"

"It's all my fault, Manji—I'm sorry…"

"What the hell's that supposed to mean?" His face went blank and he dropped his hand. "You're kiddin' me."

Rin clasped both hands over her heart, which threatened to pound its way out of her chest, and looked tearfully into his face. She could say nothing, but didn't need to, because Manji stared into her eyes and took a step backwards.

"No, you don't. You're fooling yourself, girl. Me? And _you?_ It ain't for real!"

"It's as real a feeling as I know." She gulped. "M-Manji…I…"

"Give me a break!" He started laughing. Full-throated, rough and heartless. "Haw, haw! What the hell put _that_ in your little head? I thought we cleared that up a long time ago."

Rin pressed her trembling lips together and raised her chin, holding his gaze. Manji's laughter grew a little uncertain. "Heh…aw, go on, call me a jerk and bop me on the noggin. You'll feel better." He shrugged a sheathed short sword out of his sleeve and offered it to her.

"I'm not joking."

"What? Forget about it. It'll be a cold day in hell—"

"You wanted to know, didn't you? Well, now you do. Don't you think I would have forgotten about it if I could?" She swung and knocked the sword to the ground; Manji looked startled with his empty hand still extended. "You ARE a jerk! You're horrible! I know perfectly well you'll never understand how I feel! And I _still_ dream about—"

"That's it. You don't need to fire me—I just resigned." He grabbed up the sword and thrust it back in his sleeve.

"No! Please, I didn't mean to fire you. I want you to stay!"

"No freakin' way!" He said it with as much emphasis as when he had told her he would never leave her, and turned around as if to go.

"Please, Manji! Won't you even think about it?" Abandoning all restraint, she tried to embrace him from behind. He shrugged her off and shot her a fearsome glare; Rin flinched, wondering for a moment if he meant to strike her. He'd done that before: the first time she had volunteered herself for his bed. But he didn't seem to want to touch her now even to backhand her across the face. "Wouldn't you…like it at all?"

Veins bulged on Manji's forehead. "You crazy little fool! You don't go saying that kind of thing to a guy!" He backed away as she approached.

"Why?"

"Because…because some of 'em might take you up on it. Even though you're just a kid!"

"What if I wanted you to?"

"You IDIOT! You've got no idea what you're talking about!" He tried to keep retreating, but his back hit the wall of the hut and he could go no further. Rin reached up to put her arms around his neck; Manji jerked and flung her off. "Hey! Keep yer hands to yourself!"

"I do so know what I'm talking about! I can see it's been on your mind too—you can't fool me. What's so awful? What could it hurt?"

"Aw, crap. Listen to this kid! What could it HURT? If you knew a damn thing about how a man feels when—girl, this ain't a game!"

"If there's something I need to know about men, I can learn! Go ahead, show me."

"Go ahead and show you what? That a man thinks with his little head?" Manji gave another sarcastic laugh. "Yeah, that wouldn't be too hard to prove. Suppose I were to grab you and—"

"All right." Rin laid her hands on his chest and took a deep breath. "Kiss me."

"Huh? KISS you?" His face darkened and his eye dilated. "On the…on the mouth?"

"On the cheek, of course!" She blushed fiercely; a kiss on the mouth would practically invite him straight into her bed. Had he really thought she wanted to go that far? Something had apparently gotten through to him; he was tense and apprehensive now rather than loud and scornful. "Just a little…I want you to show me what you mean."

Manji stared at her, his expression deeply unsettled. "That ain't a real good idea, kid. I promised to protect you…from guys like me, among other things."

"But you're not my bodyguard any more—you quit. So there's no conflict of interest now, is there?" She shrugged and smiled at him, fingering the collar of his _kōsōde_. Somehow the spasmodic twitching of his nose encouraged her. It wasn't often that her tough, plainspoken Manji seemed so completely taken aback…

His chest rose and fell under her hands. "Will you leave me alone if I do?" His voice sounded hoarse. "Just one kiss, and we'll consider it proved."

"Whatever you want."

Manji slowly put one arm around her waist, then tilted her chin to the side with his free hand. His breath heated her face as he rubbed his nose over her cheekbone. Rin shuddered, her eyes closing. Manji nudged her slim body between his thighs and nuzzled her ear, then straightened and withdrew. She watched him swallow hard; he looked over her head with an unfocused eye. In his heavy-lidded gaze she glimpsed thoughts she could not read.

"Manji?"

"Still want me to do it? Kiss you?"

"Y-yes…please."

"OK, whatever." He grunted and leaned down. "Your funeral."

His mouth felt firm and warm on her cheek and temple, the bristles on his unshaven chin sharp against her tender skin. With the tip of his tongue between his barely parted lips he traced a dotted line along her jaw. Rin closed her eyes again and sighed. Manji didn't pull back; he continued his caresses, breathing harder. Would he let her return the favor? Gingerly she kissed his rough cheek; he let out a quick gasp that didn't seem discouraging. She tried to find a less stubbly part of his face with her eyes shut, and their lips accidentally brushed.

Manji started and jerked his head back for a moment. Obviously this was a surprise. But almost immediately he pulled her to him and touched his lips to hers. Rin reared up in his arms, stiff with astonishment, and tried to avert her face. Manji's strong fingers along her jaw prevented her from turning her head. He kissed her yet again, mouth to mouth. Closed-mouthed, barely damp; the light contacts reverberated in her body like the thunderous beats of a huge _taikō_.

Then he adjusted the position of her chin, took a deep breath and dove in. Rin clung to Manji's shoulders for sheer support, her hands contracting into fists in the folds of his clothing. One of his hands pressed the small of her back, the other cradled her head, and he captured her mouth in earnest. Not holding back in the least, it seemed to her—maybe to prove something? Maybe because he couldn't help himself? Stinging from the pressure of his, Rin's lips yielded, opened. Insistently the moist blade of his tongue invaded and dueled with hers.

Was this what she had dreamed about, or more than she had ever been able to imagine? Rin abandoned herself to the strange intoxication that heated her body, her brain whirling in a disorienting spiral although they barely moved except to embrace each other more tightly. Manji's warm tongue ravaged her mouth, pushing deep into its recesses; their saliva freely mingled, which struck her as shockingly intimate. Her heart pounded in her throat so hard she felt as if she were choking. Although she could not keep her knees from shaking, she responded as best she could, mimicking the voracious way he kissed her and giving it right back to him. Manji groaned. His hand explored the down-slope of her haunches, his mouth sealed to hers and his whole body vibrating. Something was tickling her in the lower belly, both inside and out…

Manji suddenly withdrew his embrace and shoved her away, panting. His face was flushed, his eye wide and staring. "No. Stop it!"

"M-Manji?" Rin couldn't quite tell who he was addressing, her or himself. She put an arm against the wall for support, since her legs didn't feel steady. Manji did the same at the other corner of the hut, slumping with a palm cupped partway over his mouth. Both of them breathed heavily for several moments. Manji snapped his head around to look at Rin with an incredulous expression.

"You'd do it, wouldn't you? If I asked you to pillow with me now, you'd say yes!"

"Are…are you asking me?" Rin's heartbeat accelerated even further, though that scarcely seemed possible. Spots danced in front of her eyes.

"Hell no, I'm not!" Manji shrugged his shoulders upright and gave a contemptuous snort. "Got yer proof?"

"What? Oh…" She sagged and clamped fingertips to her mouth. He had faked that kiss? And she'd fallen for it so easily!

"Yeah, let that be a lesson to you." Manji adjusted the loosened overlap of his _kōsōde_. "Never trust a man on that score. Not even me!"

She trembled in humiliation and tears started in her eyes. "Fine. I won't."

"Aw, kid…don't take it so hard. You asked for it, sure…but I guess I carried it a little far." He wiped his lips and raked a hand through his hair, then chuckled thinly. "Didn't think it'd be quite that…dangerous."

"What?" Rin looked up. He shrugged and looked annoyed, as if regretting that he had spoken. She blinked the tears away and stared at him. "You mean it…really made you feel that way?"

His face flushed and his mouth opened for a moment. Then it closed firmly and he grimaced. "Don't get your hopes up—men are all pigs. Which is my whole point, see?"

Rin's heart gave a bold thump. "But if I'm enough of a woman to make you, um…react like a man…then maybe I'm enough of a woman to handle any danger there might be." She drew herself up straight and tried to look as womanly as possible.

Manji stared at her in naked disbelief. When she bravely held his gaze with her shaking chin pulled into her chest, he laughed with an edge of despair and sat down hard on the porch, head in his hands. "Nope. Not a chance."

"Girls my age get married all the time."

"Married? Yeah, and they have babies too. Or didn't you know that it leads to babies?"

"Uh…I guess so…but not always, right? Especially when you're young."

"I wouldn't count on that, kid!" He suddenly raised his head and made a question mark at her with one brow. "Exactly how much DO you know about pillowing?"

"Well…I've seen dogs mating in the street…and it must be something like that, except that people usually do it indoors." She blushed and shrugged. "I guess men have something like, um, that thing…that gets bigger…and then they put it, uh, between a woman's legs…and it's what husbands and wives do, and my mother's friends used to gossip about it and say that men get more out of it than a woman does, which is maybe why they like to pay for it in a brothel so they can do it more often, but I also heard that it makes a woman like a man more when she's done it with him. And that a woman can reach the Clouds and Rain the way a man does if he knows how to do it well, or if his, um, thing is the right size for her, and especially if she likes him."

Manji listened to this speech with growing incredulity, pressing his lips together as if manfully holding back a laugh. "If she…if she likes him? Holy…shit."

"Uh…is that not true?"

He got up and slapped his thighs. "I'm going into town, and I'm going to visit a bookseller's. You can come with me if you like—yeah, better tag along. We can pick out one or two that seem to be around your level."

"One or two what?"

"_Shunpon_. Pillow books. Like what your parents would've given you for a wedding present. Basic operating instructions, you got it?" At the look on her face he burst out in a hearty guffaw. "I have a feeling that seeing actual pictures of people getting it on is going to give you second thoughts like nothing else. And all the better too. Come on, I'll buy you some noodles for lunch." Still laughing, he strode off.

Continued…

**Note on kissing:** It's a common belief among Westerners and Japanese alike that kissing is a Western practice that was introduced into Japan by Europeans. Even a quick study of antique Japanese erotic prints will show that is not the case. However, the context of a kiss was specifically related to sex in traditional Japanese culture, and in the historical time period of Blade of the Immortal it was considered disgustingly obscene to kiss in public. Kisses were censored from Hollywood movies imported into Japan up to 1945. Until the post-war era, if a Japanese woman were to allow a man to kiss her on the lips (or in conservative rural areas, even to let him hold her hand) she would have been understood to have given consent to intercourse.

However, there are scenes of kissing in BotI that are clearly meant in the romantic rather than purely sexual sense. Again, the manga incorporates a mixture of tradition and modern Japanese customs and should probably be interpreted without strict reference to either.


	3. Chapter 3

The characters and universe of Blade of the Immortal/_Mugen no Junin_ are copyrighted by Hiroaki Samura and do not belong to me. Not one _sen_ will come into my hands in consequence of this story.

Squick warnings: Sex in various forms, including quasi-incestuous themes and a 16-year-old female paired with an adult male. Violence will eventually rear its head as well; hey, you have to separate at least one body part from its owner in any BotI story.

**Note for this site:** This is only a teaser! I will not be archiving the entire story here because of its content. Please check my Livejournal for the complete version. Click on my name at the top of the page to see my profile and find a link to get there.

**Abstinence Education**

**by Madame Manga**

**Part Three**

"Uh…that looks kinda uncomfortable." Rin put a hand over her mouth and stared at a woodcut illustration in the book that sat open on her lap. A man and woman lay among tangled clothing and quilts, their limbs equally tangled and their sexual parts highlighted in sharp detail. "He really has to put it…um, his _henoko_…all the way inside her _bobo_?"

"Yeah, that's the general idea." Manji snorted and puffed out a cloud of tobacco smoke. "Though I gotta admit the pictures make a dick look a lot bigger than it is."

"Oh. That's good." She gulped and turned the page. More acrobatic positions, more sweaty, transported faces with open mouths. "Is the woman supposed to be enjoying herself?"

"…Yep."

"It doesn't hurt? She likes it when he's inside there?"

"Maybe she does. Doesn't much matter to a man—it feels the same to him either way."

Rin looked up from where she sat on the ground at the back of the little hut. Manji lounged on the porch above her with his back against the wall, his legs crossed one over the other. He had his head tilted upwards with his pipe in his mouth and an abstracted look on his face. "Just the same? Doesn't a man care if a woman likes it?"

"Depends on the man."

"But…you would care, wouldn't you?"

He snorted again. "Maybe, if I wasn't too drunk. But if I buy a woman, she's there to make me happy, not the other way around. Some guys preen themselves on making whores moan—like working girls are hard to please, or something."

"Didn't you ever pillow with a woman who wasn't a, um, professional?"

"Sure, housemaids and so on. I'd slip 'em some cash, though. It's understood."

"Then…you were never with a woman just because you wanted to please her…?"

"Nope." He snapped it out short and knocked the ashes from his pipe.

"Oh."

"Look, I was never married, or even promised. There ain't no point in taking pains with a serving girl, and a _samurai_ woman doesn't do it before her wedding night. You know that." He smirked at her while tamping in a fresh pinch of tobacco. "And even if I'd been hitched, there's not too many guys who put a high priority on making their wives feel good in the _futon_. Get her screwed, get her pregnant, let her raise the brats and continue your family name. That's what marriage is all about, darlin'." He re-lit his pipe with a coal. "The only gals who can demand satisfaction are high-class courtesans and _geisha_, and you've got to be rolling in _kōban_ to afford one of those for alover."

Rin's illusions began to crumple like wetted paper. "But my father and mother… They loved each other so much. Don't you think my father would have…?"

"Hey, I never knew your folks, so that's hard to say. Though I guess…" Manji looked down at her. "They raised _you_, after all. If you believe in true love and all that shi—uh…maybe it's because you saw it right in front of you." He briefly put a hand on her shoulder, got up and walked off a little distance, smoking.

Rin shut the pillow book and wiped her eyes, which were filling with tears. Manji leaned against one of the trees near the cabin with his back to her and finished his pipe.

After a while she approached him again and sat on the ground next to the tree, studying the book again but asking no questions. Manji put his pipe away and watched the sun decline in the sky. "Well…it's about time to try some fishing." He folded his arms and didn't move. Rin looked up.

"So…you don't think I ought to do things like this before I'm married." Rin indicated the book.

"Nope, I don't. That's just my opinion. Like…what your big brother would tell you, if you had a big brother." Manji rubbed his nose. "Can't say it ain't your decision, though—I guess you're old enough to make up your own mind."

"So my big brother would say I ought to think about my…reputation? Because I'm from a _samurai_ family?"

He laughed slightly and shook his head. "If you want to. Not what I'd call the main objection in your case, though."

"Well, if I shouldn't do it with a man unless I'm married, maybe I could marry…you."

Manji suppressed a sigh, scratching his ribcage under his clothing; obviously he had been expecting this. "There's no way on earth you can marry an outlaw, Rin. He ain't allowed to get hitched, and he'd be arrested just for filling out the paperwork for the license. But what I was talkin' about is the basic problem with having a husband in the first place—that is, rug rats."

"Children? Oh…"

"Cramp your style as a _kenshi_, wouldn't they?" He chuckled.

"Yes, I guess that would mean the end of my vendetta." Rin bit her lips and looked away. "OK, I get your point."

"Sorry."

"No, don't be. You're only telling me the truth. I wasn't thinking this through…I guess I am just an idiot."

"Naw, little sister, you're no dummy. You got it quick." Manji tapped her head in a reassuring way. "You just need the facts, and you put two and two together."

"So I'll have to stay a virgin until Anotsu Kagehisa is dead."

He flinched slightly and rubbed his neck to cover it. "Uh…that's one way to put it."

"Yes, but…" Rin flipped to a page in the pillow book that had intrigued yet confused her and handed it up to Manji. "Look at this picture."

"Huh?" He took the book and squinted at it. "What about it?"

"What's she supposed to be doing? She's got the same look on her face as all the other women in the book, but there's no man with her. What are those things she has all over the floor, and that one in her hand?"

Manji laughed out loud, though with an underlying sense of embarrassment. "Uh…those are…ahem…_harigata_."

"What are they for?"

"Just like you see." He made a vague gesture. "She's more or less doing a demonstration."

"You mean…it's supposed to be a substitute for a man?"

"Yep." He cleared his throat again and chuckled. "Maybe an improvement on a man, all things considered. It never stays out too late drinking or upchucks on the _tatami_!"

"But does that feel good? When it's just a tube made out of tortoise shell?"

"How the hell would I know? At least it's always stiff." Manji raised a brow. "Frankly, this looks like an ad for the whole line of toys that place sells…" He turned the book sideways and whistled. "Now why didn't I think of that?"

"Think of what?" Their eyes met; she knew perfectly well that they were thinking along exactly the same lines. "You mean I should try one of _those _if I'm curious to know what a man feels like?"

"Up to you." He tossed the book back to her. "Far as I know, lots of women use _harigata_."

"That does seem sensible, since it can't make you pregnant." She tilted her head. "But it can't hold you or kiss you, either…"

Manji made a choking sound, bolted to the hut to retrieve his fishing pole and jogged down the hill to his favorite spot by the pond.

Continued…only at my Livejournal! See my profile for a link to read more of the story.


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